While we’ve also been doing baseball activities and the letter B, for now here are our bat activities. We have made bats, learned bat facts, sang songs, and will soon be going to watch bats. Apparently our zoo got the memo because they are having Bat Day this Saturday and next week we are going to a museum program under a bridge to look at bats. We also walked around the room flapping our arms and pretending to be bats quite a bit this week and since many bats eat insects we played our Swat the Bug game (I love getting more use out of activities). Maybe we have learned too much about bats–last night when going to sleep Mia kept insisting a bat was flying around her room eating insects.

Hanging Bats

My sister came up with this craft and it is adorable! She really wanted the girls to make a bat that could hang upside down and hopefully we did it justice.

I had the girls paint the ball and cardboard roll separately. Then we glued all the pieces together once they were dry. My plan was actually to paint them black and then cover all of it with glitter paint, but I’m trying to not buy more craft supplies and we didn’t have black paint. So we went with brown paint and the girls liked playing with them so we never got around to sparkles.

Hand and Feet Bats

We definitely need to do more hand/footprint crafts because the girls thought tracing their hands and feet was hilarious. We made these to remember two of our main bat facts that involve bats’s hands and feet: bats hang by their feet and their hands (and arms) make their wings.

Bat Calling

To call bats, have everyone lay down in a circle. Go around the circle taking turns clapping. The first time you clap once and then each person in the circle claps once. The next time, two, etc. Go up to about 10 and then come down again. It should cause bats to fly down around you. Now when the girls did this it didn’t work at all but they just clapped a whole bunch. 🙂 But when my Girl Scout troop did this years ago it really did work.

Echolocation Game

To learn that bats use sound in order to “see,” blind fold the little ones. Stand a little ways away and shake a rattle or other instrument. Have the kids come to the sound of the rattle. Depending on the age you can decide how far to stand.

Bat Music

When we trying the echolocation game, the girls decided that everyone needed a rattle which quickly devolved into a jam session. They played their instruments while I sang our bat songs over and over. When I tried to stop singing, Zoe handed me a microphone and told me to keep singing. 🙂

Bats Are Sleeping (Tune:Frere Jacques)
Bats are sleeping, bats are sleeping
Upside down, Upside down,
Sleeping in the morning sun, Waiting for the night to come
Then they’ll fly around, then they’ll fly around

For the most part we just sang the bat chorus but the rest of the song is great too, encouraging comfort in the wilderness. You can find the complete lyrics here.

Felt Board Story

It’s been awhile since we’ve done the felt board but it was fun to break it out again and the girls seemed to really enjoy playing with it again. For a print out of all the songs and poems, click here: Bats Songs/Poems

Five Bats

Five black bats ready to soar
One stayed behind, now theer are four.
Four black bats hanging from a tree;
One fell down, now there are three.
Three black bats wondering what to do,
One flew away and now there are two.
Two black bats sitting in the sun
One fell asleep leaving only one.
One lonesome bat, with no place to go,
Went hiding in a cave, Now there are zero.

Little Bats
1 little bat was trying to behave.
He hung upside down from his feet in a cave.
Another bat flew in, and said, “How do you do?”
The second joined the first, and then there were 2!

2 little bats were trying to behave.
They hung upside down from their feet in a cave.
To help pass the time, they sang “Do re me”
Another bat joined the song, and then there were 3.

3 little bats were trying to behave
They hung upside down from their feet in a cave
From their cave perch, they looked down at the floor,
A new bat joined the game, and then there were 4.

4 little bats were trying to behave.
They hung upside down from their feet in a cave.
One little bat zoomed inside and did a dive.
He stayed to take a rest, and with him there were 5.

Who Am I?

I think this is where I'm suppose to say something witty about myself. Oh well. I'm a stay-at-home mom to three awesome kids--our twin daughters who are seven now and a two-year-old son who is full of energy. In my pre-children life I was a teacher and I now homeschool our children. I'm also married to Ed, who is currently serving in the Air Force, and is the love of my life (it'd be awkward if he wasn't). Our family is big on books, crafts, and having fun together. I just thought I would share our activities in my own little corner of the internet.

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